Well, we don’t have our furniture from the U.S., yet, but we decided to acquire our first Nigerian piece of furniture. Now furniture in Nigeria is mostly made of wood, usually mahogany, and it’s thick, heavy, and usually hand-carved. One of my Shell colleagues was transferring to Kuala Lumpur, and they had had a custom-made bar built for entertaining while in Nigeria. While Julie bought their curtains and vacuum-cleaner, I made an arrangement to purchase their bar. It came with all of its glassware and any alcohol left-over from its last party on Friday night. The only catch – we were responsible for arranging moving it on Saturday.
On Saturday morning, we hired a group of drivers, security and other local workers at the original owner’s complex to get the bar down 3 flights of stairs, (elevators – what are elevators?). Although the bar weighs ~500 lbs, the stairwells were wide, and the group of 6-8 men maneuvered it down to the front successfully.
Then, we hired a local driver with a small covered truck to move the bar the 8 blocks from the original owner’s complex to our own complex. Upon arriving at our complex, we again hired a group of local men to carry the bar up one flight of stairs to our Unit. Unfortunately, our stairwells are much narrower, and this required a complex series of rotations and inversions to navigate our way up. Finally, however, the bar made it into our unit, and everyone was happy to have made a few naira!
And so, we are poised to host our first “happy hour”! We may not have much furniture, few dishes, and little entertainment, but we have a place to pull up a stool, rest your elbows, and chat with friends over a few drinks. Of course, all of our friends are welcome to drop in any time – hope to see you soon….
